What is Schema Therapy?
Schema Therapy is a needs-based approach, and it is designed to address unmet needs and to help clients with their thinking patterns, emotional reactions and behaviours by developing healthier coping tools.
It is a comprehensive therapy model which aims at both building awareness and creating change in your life. Some therapy approaches only focus on the current problems and enabling change and some other therapy approaches might tend to focus on the past events and building awareness. Schema therapy seeks the right balance between these two different therapy schools. It focuses on the origins of the current problems to use this knowledge for creating a long-term solution. Therefore, schema therapy is focused on creating life transformations.
What are schemas?
Schema therapy’s target is identifying and changing unhelpful schemas. Schemas are negative, stable, enduring, long term patterns which consist of important beliefs and feelings about oneself and the others which arose as a result of the unmet needs in childhood. Schemas are not always in awareness; they get triggered by the events. You might feel perfectly fine for a while and the next day you might find yourself struggling. When a schema is triggered, we experience debilitating struggles, sometimes even mental health issues and might not cope with the challenges in life because a maladaptive schema consists of negative beliefs and unhelpful coping tools. When our schemas are activated, we might get triggered by small things and tend to overreact, getting stuck in similar situations, forming unhelpful relationships and engaging in unhelpful coping tools.
How does Schema Therapy work?
The goal in schema therapy is empowering the healthy adult in you which represents good judgment, psychological health, and maturity. Schema therapy is going to help to meet the unmet core needs; as a result, schemas would get triggered less frequently and less intensely with the possibility of a quick recovery. Schema therapy aims for you to get triggered less, be impacted by the triggers less and have healthy coping tools which you can use to cope with the difficulties in life.
We start with the awareness building phase and then to move on to the change phase with regular sessions.
What happens in the initial sessions of Schema Therapy?
You are going to find out more about your schemas which will help you to feel more empowered to give them up. We are also going to talk about your early life experiences when we see a link between your current issues and past life.
What happens in a regular Schema Therapy Session?
Schema therapy is a structured and a goal focused approach. Each session is an opportunity to work towards the therapy goals. We usually start with a check-in to have a look at the previous week, see if any of the schemas are activated and then continue working on the activated schemas with different techniques.
Schema Therapy Techniques
Chair work: The technique is used with the goal of clients to externalise the schemas, to see how they operate in their lives and strengthen the healthy adult mode while making other unhealthy modes less effective in their lives.
Imagery: Imagery rescripting exercises are used to challenge schemas at the emotional level to build healthier emotional patterns.
Behavioural Pattern Breaking: Behavioural pattern breaking techniques focus on replacing schema or mode driven patterns of behaviour with more healthier ones. We discuss with the client where to initiate the behavioural change and decide on next steps.
Issues Treated with Schema Therapy
You will find Schema Therapy useful for you if any of the below applies to you.
- You experience low levels of self-esteem, and struggle with self-worth.
- You have relationship difficulties or struggle to build satisfying relationships.
- You struggle with friendships.
- You worry a lot.
- You feel constantly low.
- You have body image problems.
- You have eating problems and/ or eating disorders.
- You struggle with unhelpful coping tools in life such as binge watching, binge eating, high amount of alcohol consumption or usage of drugs.
- You have been to therapy before it helped you with awareness building but struggle to change things.
- You had a difficult childhood.
Schema Therapist in London
Tennur Katgi
BA Psychology, MA Clinical Psychology
CBT Therapist, Accredited Schema Therapist
Accredited Member of BACP
I am an accredited counsellor, CBT and Schema Therapist in London. I mostly work with people who had a difficult childhood such as experiencing trauma, being bullied, or lacking emotional support and now experience depression, panic and anxiety, difficulties in relationships, low self-esteem, borderline personality disorder, eating disorders and body image issues.
I help people with a wide range of psychological problems at my private practice in central London and offer online sessions, if you are unable to attend in person.
Schema Therapy FAQ
How do I arrange a Schema Therapy consultation?
You can arrange a Schema Therapy consultation session by using our contact form and we aim to get back to you in 48 hours. Please share some brief information about your therapy needs. In-person meetings take place in Central London and virtual meetings are offered via Skype.
How many sessions will I need?
Schema Therapy is a long term approach which aims at a life transformation. It is highly recommended to commit for at least 20 sessions.
How much does Schema Therapy cost?
Each session fee is between 80£ to 90£.
Is Schema Therapy the right psychotherapy approach for me?
Schema Therapy is especially useful in the treatment of issues related to childhood difficulties such as adverse life events, dysfunctional family patterns, peer pressure and bullying, competitive family environment, and childhood traumas. It is also helpful to recover from long term mental health issues such as recurrent depression, long term anxiety, low- self esteem, and attachment issues.
What Our Clients Have Said Following Schema Therapy
“I had a difficult childhood and always hold myself responsible for my mental health issues. I can now see the origins of my issues and better equipped to deal with the impact of my past. “
“I previously received therapy for anxiety for years which helped to a limited extent. I no longer struggle with it after 20 sessions of Schema Therapy. “
“I was struggling with attachment and having a healthy relationship. Tennur helped me to understand my attachment style and how to build long lasting, healty relationships.”
“I always struggled with low-self confidence and never had the courage to dream big. We discovered thst it was related to my inner critic and I gained my confidence to progress in my career.”
Schema Therapy Available In Central London
Schema Therapy in London
My psychotherapy practice is easily accessible from Farringdon Station which is a 5-minute walk. It is within easy travelling distance of many areas of London such as Angel, Hackney, Camden, Euston, Fitzrovia as well as Liverpool Street Station.